Author Iain Banks has died aged 59, two months after announcing he had terminal cancer, his family has said.

The Scottish writer revealed in April he was suffering from terminal gall bladder cancer and was unlikely to live for more than a year.

He was best known for his novels The Wasp Factory, The Crow Road and Complicity.

Well, shiitake. I kind of expected another couple of months, at least.

To say that Iain (M) Banks was the center of my literary landscape in the 90's would be an understatement. His generally-brilliant books led me to other Scots SF writers-- Ken Macleod, Alastair Reynolds, Charlie Stross, others. In the days before amazon.co.uk, I visited Waterstone's whenever I was near Newbury Street because it was the only bookstore in Boston that always had his new books when they came out, the UK editions before they were published in the US.

And then of course, the Culture List, which led to some lasting friendships, meeting people in Baltimore and Washington DC and London.

It's not going to be the same sort of world without an Iain Banks in it, drinking scotch and coming up with incredible distant futures.

_________________"...anarchists only want to burn cars and punch cops."- nickvicious"We'll be eating our own words 30 years from now when we're demanding our legislators outlaw aerosol-based cyber dildo-wielding death holograms."- Brian

We read The Wasp Factory in highschool, and it was completely different from anything else we were reading. It still kinda haunts me.

Edited to add: That English teacher was the best teacher I ever, ever had (and English was far from my favourite subject). He passed away the year after I left highschool and now I'm doubly sad remembering him. He made me love reading again.

I'm unfamiliar with his work, but everything I've read about him since he announced his illness makes me want to read his books.

Watch out, because (especially early on) he has a vicious sense of humor. If you can make it through The Wasp Factory you should be able to handle anything else, though.

A review:

"If a nastier, more vicious or distasteful novel appears this spring, I shall be surprise. But there is unlikely to be a better one either. You can hardly breathe for fear of missing a symbol, or a fine phrase, or a horror so chilling that your hair stands on end. Infinitely painful to read, grotesque but human, these pages have a totality rare in fiction. A mighty imagination has arrived on the scene." - Mail on Sunday

I don't know if it's _that_ awful, but it's certainly quite grotesque. I can't recommend it enough, but beware.

I adore The Wasp Factory. I read it when I was 16, just a few days before going to see a stunning stage version. The twists and turns in it were completely unexpected. Knowing that books could be like that was a bit of an epiphany to my teenage self and made me want to read more.

Watch out, because (especially early on) he has a vicious sense of humor. If you can make it through The Wasp Factory you should be able to handle anything else, though.

A review:

"If a nastier, more vicious or distasteful novel appears this spring, I shall be surprise. But there is unlikely to be a better one either. You can hardly breathe for fear of missing a symbol, or a fine phrase, or a horror so chilling that your hair stands on end. Infinitely painful to read, grotesque but human, these pages have a totality rare in fiction. A mighty imagination has arrived on the scene." - Mail on Sunday

I don't know if it's _that_ awful, but it's certainly quite grotesque. I can't recommend it enough, but beware.

You know, this just moved him right to the top of my "to read" list. Thanks!

Watch out, because (especially early on) he has a vicious sense of humor. If you can make it through The Wasp Factory you should be able to handle anything else, though.

A review:

"If a nastier, more vicious or distasteful novel appears this spring, I shall be surprise. But there is unlikely to be a better one either. You can hardly breathe for fear of missing a symbol, or a fine phrase, or a horror so chilling that your hair stands on end. Infinitely painful to read, grotesque but human, these pages have a totality rare in fiction. A mighty imagination has arrived on the scene." - Mail on Sunday

I don't know if it's _that_ awful, but it's certainly quite grotesque. I can't recommend it enough, but beware.

You know, this just moved him right to the top of my "to read" list. Thanks!

Same! Can't wait to read it. And so deeply sorry that the world lost another great author.

Okay, so if you want to start reading Iain Banks, here are my recommendations:

Non-SF:

The Wasp Factory -- yeah, pretty nasty, but also fascinating and, as they say, very human. A study of a very broken family, but not broken in any straight-up Lifetime Original Movie sort of way. A more striking first novel I have not read.

Espedair Street -- a very short novel, one of my favorite fictional rock bios.

The Bridge -- experimental prose, lots of layers, some very strange jokes. Imagery you will not soon forget. Has a happy ending, but it's in another book entirely.

Complicity -- a very nasty novel about very nasty stuff.

SF novels:

Consider Phlebas -- if you were to start reading Culture novels, this is the one to start with. Dismantles SF tropes and puts them back together in a bunch of different ways. Postmodern, but not tedious. Pretty much launched the "New Space Opera" movement in British SF.

Use of Weapons -- I don't want to say too much, but it is the best of the Culture novels.

Excession, Against A Dark Background, really, his SF is generally quite good. You could do far worse than just going down the list in order. Same with his non-genre fiction, although I tend to think his SF is generally stronger than his non-SF books.

Skip: Canal Dreams (I have tried and tried to like it, but man. Not gonna happen.)

The Wasp Factory was the only book my former reading group read that I never finished. I got to the part about the rabbits and got so angry and disgusted that I literally threw the book against a wall and never read another word. I have been afraid to read any more of his work since then.

_________________Ain't no guarantees in life, and nothing that comes out of my vagina can change that. - Erika Soyf*cker